Teachers TV - A video for Teaching Assistant's to help control angry classroom behaviour!

To all Teaching Assistants out there working for Classroom and beyond, please watch this excellent video from Teachers TV which gives some extremely useful techniques for coping with a students angry behaviour, whether you work with a child one to one or in a whole class setting.

Are there some useful techniques on here? What strategies do you use in the classroom? Do our teachers who are here teaching in the UK have any ideas to help Teaching Assistants in class - after all its a team effort?!

Tormented by the Under Fives....

Can children as young as 3 years old really cause chaos in the classroom? Are there really 3 year old bullies using violence in schools and intimidating teachers and other pupils?

When I first read the article published in The Times by Frank Furedi about toddlers terrorising their teachers I was shocked and more than a little sceptical. How can a very young child threaten an adult? It seems that they can.....

Frank Furedi's article looks at government figures which show that more than 1000 pupils aged 4 or below were suspended from state schools and nurseries in England last year. The figures also reveal that children of the same age group have been expelled for "racist behaviour, sexual misconduct and theft". Going further the figures reveal that 390 children were sent home from school in 2007 for a racist offence and 240 suspended for sexual misconduct.

In his article, Furedi questions if young primary pupils are turning into "sexual predators or racist zealots". One might be tempted to agree until, like Furedi you stop and think about what this means.

Perhaps this is only an opinion but surely children as young as 3 cannot be held accountable for an innapropriate comment or action? Furedi believes that the issue is more about an obsession in society to control children by means other than exercising child authority. In other words - telling children off isn't enough today and neither is explaining to a young child why their remark or action was wrong. Instead, teachers today are relying on the bureacracy of warning letters to parents and school suspensions rather than dealing with the issue directly.

Furedi is correct in pointing out that authority in British schools is struggling. Gaining respect from even very young students is tough. Many teachers can I am sure give examples of occasions where they have felt uncomfortable or even threatened and perhaps the biggest issue facing teachers is the fact that they feel helpless to deal with the situations without fearing they will be accused of stepping over the line either by parents or by colleagues. Furedi points to an example where a teaching assistant was reprimanded at her school for raising her voice and pointing a finger at a child who had just bitten her! Instead of being able to deal with the bad behaviour there and then she was expected to write a report about it. She felt helpless and resented the fact she was not trusted to do her job.

Perhaps the bad behaviour noted in Furedi's research is because of an adults changing response to a situation rather than a epidemic of bad behaviour developing amongst very young children. Furedi points to an example where a 4 year old calls a classmate "gay". Is it right for a teacher to interpret this as homophobia? Is it right to treat young children to the same moral standards as those we impose on an adult society? If we do then perhaps it is easier to understand why 3 and 4 year olds are being expelled for racism and sexual misconduct.

So if the children aren't changing but the way in which we deal with them is - where do we go from here? I for one do not feel qualified to answer this one but it is certainly food for thought.

As professionals who are here teaching in the UK Your views on Frank Furedi's article would we welcomed.

What does it take to be a special needs teacher?

So, you're a mainstream teacher and you want to broaden your horizons. You've often thought about Special Needs teaching but it's not an option as you don't hold any SEN qualifications - right?

Well, not necessarily is the initial answer! When we register teachers with Classroom one of the questions we will inevitably ask is "do you have any interest in working in special needs"? The response we get is more often than not the same - "I am very interested but I am not qualified". It's a popular misconception that you can ONLY work with special needs students if you posess the correct certificates and certainly if you hold qualifications then you stand a great chance of securing an SEN post. But its also true that many teachers who started out in the mainstream have successfully made the transition in to certain areas within the special needs arena without any specialist qualifications.

It goes without saying that certain SEN posts DO require particular qualifications or training. For example, Eleanor in our Special Needs team is currently looking for a teacher of the deaf and for this role you most certainly do need to be qualified. In the same vein, most teaching roles with Non verbal students (eg Autism) will require you to communicate using Maketon and PECS. As our own specialist SEN team will testify - there are a multitude of jobs which require specialist skills when working in SEN and if you wish to explore these options then you could find yourself with a very rewarding new direction to your teaching.

At the same time - there are SEN jobs out there which dont require specialist training. As Lucy, manager of Classroom's SEN team discusses, they also look at the mainstream experience that a teacher has had, particularly since inclusion has become the norm. What about the pupil in your Year 6 class who had learning difficulties? Or the partially sighted student whom you supported during your Chemistry lesson? All valuable teaching experience which you can bring to a specific SEN environment. Of particular interest is Lucy's revelation that they often place teachers in to an EBD (Emotional and behavioural difficulties) post who have little or no specific EBD unit experience. What those of you who have taught in London or various other inner city schools might not realise is that you have probably developed great behavioural management tools that you can transfer into an EBD environment and our SEN team are always keen to tap in to these skills.

Of course not everyone reading this will feel that the teaching experience they have gained will give them sufficient insight in to working specifically with SEN students. Lucy has spoken with plenty of teachers in this situation and her number one piece of advice is to consider developing your SEN skills via the Teaching Assistant route. Classroom has a very large support division and has regularly placed teachers in to SEN settings as a teaching assistant in order to become familiar with the environment and start to develop the skills necessary to cope in an SEN post. In asking her to sum up the qualities she feels are best suited to teaching in the SEN sector, Lucy recommends that teachers with empathetic personalities will do well. Traits such as patience, resilience and versatility are also highly valued. A lot of teachers transferring from the mainstream come to SEN expecting a very rigid structure and whilst rules and expectations are always present - an SEN environment is ever changing. As Lucy suggests - "expect the unexpected"!

For those teachers with a keen interest in Special needs teaching but with little practical experience - the following websites might be worth a browse. Alternatively - if you fancy chatting to someone about SEN then Classroom's specialist team of Lucy, Julie and Eleanor are always very happy to address any of your concerns!

Further Reading:

http://www.everychildmatters.gov.uk/

http://www.equals.co.uk/

http://www.senteacher.org/

Guest Blog: Is it all in the name?

Our second guest blogger is Nicole Morgan, a consultant here at Classroom who works in the Primary team. She is taking a look at whether you can judge a student by his or her name! Read on:

New term, new class, new names to learn. September each year inevitably brings with it a fresh bunch of ‘darlings’ still bubbling with the excitement of the summer, some fresh faced and ready to learn, others less so perhaps. So, as you cast your experienced eye over the register of this year’s cohort what images spring to mind? Will you need to watch out for Connor clobbering Callum at morning break? Will this year’s Brandon be as brutal as last years and will Elisabeth be the one educating YOU in Science this afternoon?

A recent online survey by parenting organisation Bounty.com explored the dialogue surrounding school children’s names. Of the 3000 teachers surveyed, nearly half admitted to possessing pre-conceived ideas of the characteristics and behaviour of a student based on their name alone, prior to their stepping foot into the classroom.

Topping the list of the ‘naughty’ names are both Callum and Connor for the boys coupled with Chelsea and Courtney for the girls, whilst the teachers surveyed seem to have agreed that the Alexanders, Adams and Elisabeths of the class tend to exhibit signs of being the brightest students. Of course, as Faye Mingo of Bounty stresses, ‘Teachers are only human and make assumptions like the rest of us’. One teacher, whose thoughts are cited in McDonagh’s times article, Names that mean trouble, reinforces these thoughts; ‘I went through my new class list and mentally circled the ones I thought would be most difficult. I reckon I have a 75% hit rate’

Top Ten Naughtiest Boys & Girls Names

1. Callum & Chelsea
2. Connor & Courtney
3. Jack & Chardonnay
4. Daniel & Aleisha
5. Brandon & Casey
6. Charlie & Crystal
7. Kyle & Jessica
8. Liam & Brooke
9. Jake & Demi
10. Brooklyn & Aisha

There are also perhaps some parallels to the adult world to be drawn here? The caddish characteristics of Callum Best and the wild ways of Courtney Love seem, if past press coverage is anything to go by, to have extended way beyond their childhood classrooms?!

It is perhaps noteworthy that another result of Bounty’s survey shows the overlap between the naughty and the popular; Jack, Daniel, Brooke and Courtney all feature on both top ten lists respectively. 57% of the teachers involved in research confirmed these findings by adding that the naughty children often find it easier to make friends and gain popularity than the their well behaved counterparts.

McDonagh, also notes in her recent Times article, ‘children who are called after places, or characters and actors in soaps and American sitcoms are likely to come from families who not only watch soaps but terrifyingly model themselves on them. Their children behave accordingly.’ A broad statement to make indeed, but could there be some socially founded link between the namers, the names and the behaviours exhibited? Food for thought perhaps…

As those teaching in this years classrooms, we’d love to hear your thoughts on this discussion; does a cheeky Charlie or a brainy Becky feature on your register?

Resource Focus Part One - TEACHERS TV

An aim of Classroom's blog is to ensure that we are recommending and advising useful resources to help you in your role as Teacher or Classroom assistant. It is not to be underestimated how useful readily available resources can be to help you deliver the best lessons in your repertoire.

Teachers TV has long been championed by our colleague Victoria who runs Classroom Canada, and rightly so. Teachers TV is a UK channel which broadcasts to help all teachers improve their teaching no matter what their background or level of experience. Its an excellent channel (a satellite channel available via freeview) and indeed website. You may not ever be in the mood to flick through your satellite channels and choose Teachers TV over The X Factor (who would?!) but my recommendation is that you use it as an online resource when you're on your laptop and in 'work mode'! Its simple to navigate and has some superb videos looking at a wide array of topics - for example - behaviour management, lesson planning and all areas of Special Needs. Most are about 15 minutes in length and give you the opportunity to learn in the most interactive way of all - as a viewer!

You can spend a lot of time navigating the Teachers TV website but it will be worth it. I stumbled across this excellent video attached where behavioural expert Sue Cowley observes and comments on a Year 5 Primary lesson which has been suffering from a small handful of disruptive pupils. Watch as she provides support and coaching for the class teacher through a hidden earpiece!

This is the first of many resource recommendations on the Classroom blog. What do you think of Teachers TV? And do you have any better suggestions for classroom resources for teaching in London? Let us know!